Rinaldi

Will do, thank you.

Took a crack at doing a late-summer Scenario after replaying the CMBS Russian campaign. Liked the look and feel of the map, figured it could pass for the Lorraine's rolling hills and open sight-lines with a bit of work. Used it as an inspiration for recreating a semi-historical scenario. Treadheads will like this one. Download HERE Best played as Allied v. AI or H2H; note that the more experienced player should play as the Germans. Market Garden Expansion is required. Map Size: 3008m x 1680m Battle Size: Battalion-sized forces. Ample artillery, no airpower. There is no Allied AI plan. ___ Take command of the famous 37th Tank Battalion and attached elements during their attack into the rear of the 553.Grenadier-Division on September, 1944. Alternatively, play against an opponent and try to frustrate the American's advances. Allied difficulty level: Low. Axis difficulty level: High Spare no criticism, so long as it remains constructive, but do be mindful of the operational situation I'm trying to capture. Allied victory is based as much on getting the crossroads as it is getting armor off the map when that is completed. This means that for a H2H situation, even a mobility-kill is going to score the German player points. Finally, German forces are supposed to capture the generally confused nature of the 553 and its neighboring units - cohesion is not going to be the by-word when a division of armor is 20 miles behind your MLR - but don't worry, they eventually get units that can handle themselves. Anyone who can offer a good set of alternative AI plans for the Axis is welcome to suggest them - I want a modicum of replayability. Thanks in advance, guys.

Safe trip, you've left us with more than enough to enjoy. Can't wait to see what happens next.

Its very tit-for-tat, gripping stuff.

What a turnaround. I know too well about being blinded by anger, but hey, sometimes being overly aggressive will make him lose balance.

Drama! Haha - Don't leave us hanging, man. Pull yourself together and report!

A sock puppet account, eh? That would go a long way to explain his complaint thread. Well regardless, kick some behind, thanks for doing yet another AAR.

Fire Support Company, 3rd Parachute Bn, 25th Brigade - not your typical Ukrainian formation, these men are professionals and form part of the only UA brigade capable of being air-dropped or parachuted into combat. They are, for now, doing neither. Fighting as light infantry bereft of even the slightest IFV support, and being forced to use old MT series guns as scratch artillery, the Paras find themselves fed into the line to stop a Mot-Rifles attack. The Battalion commander has placed the considerable AT assets, outdated though they are, into a clever crossfire. The Russians, forced to come over a ridge time and again, can surely only watch in horror as they lose BTR after BTR. T90As eventually roll up, but they too are disabled by AT-4 fire. Exposed positions are hit by artillery, suspected positions are hit by smoke. Yet every time the Russians take to the ridge, they have missed or failed to adequately suppress at least one angle. The Russian attack is about to become a serious disaster. From an ongoing PBEM.

Yes, please, an AAR. Sublime and Bud_B have been two treasure troves of tactical lessons of late. The more the merrier.

Fantastic battle, thanks for the little break down of your mistakes. Hope to see another from you soon.

The Dev team is smaller than my pinky finger and is working on several projects at once. Next. I'm imagining delicious, open flanks. Over-concentration rarely ends well and can be easily punished by a dynamic and mobile enemy. Where you see hoplessness, others would say there's opportunity. This is preposterous as an argument, to discount this. By your math, which I just checked is correct, a Company of Abrams costs 1.5x the cost of a Company of T90s. Lets say we're playing an 8500 point meeting engagement, that leaves the Russian player with almost 4000 points to play with. The US player, by contrast, is over budget already. The Russians can put a larger, powerful all-arms force in the field for cheaper. This is the literal definition of balance. If the US Player wants a balanced force, he might have to settle for a Platoon of Abrams. Now we have 4 tanks against 9; more than a surmountable obstacle for the Russian forces. Your argument simply boils down to "Well I cannot take them on one to one" - Splendid, the dev team did their job then. Here's food for thought: Has it occurred to you that you can win a tactical victory while incurring slightly more losses than your opponent in certain sectors? The game is, after all, a tactical-level simulator. I'm not discounting your concerns in a general sense, they're valid, I've even gone out of my way to show you actual, legitimate issues people have been able to find with the US forces - and have backed it up with reproduce able results. I just don't think your particular issues really deserve the dev team's attentions, sorry. They're not legitimate to me. Sounds to me you just have a fundamental disagreement with the design philosophy of the game; and I don't doubt BFC's research on the capabilities of the AFVs in game in the slightest.

Okay @IanL since you broke the ice...I'll put on my gaiters and wade in. I don't want to be 'that guy' but I'll say it: Are you trying to go hammerhead-to-hammerhead with Abrams? Then yes....you should be getting chewed up and badly. The T90AM (which I remind you, is not in service as of 2015 - so you can thank BFC for giving Russia the benefit of that doubt) is more than capable of eating Abrams up...if handled intelligently. However, since the game is set in 2017, and BFC has already taken the extraordinary step of giving T90AMs with their Relikt armor and all, we've also recieved the (currently not in service) modern sabots meant to defeat Relikt armor. You wouldn't charge a Sherman 76 across 2km of open ground to attack a dug in Jagdpanther if you have a covered route of approach, right? So why are you doing it with T90s - excuse the assumption. The Russians have an edge on battlefield observation and tank destroyers over the US, you should be playing with your T90s close to the chest. A US player will almost inevitably lead with his M1s, you should never be putting something big and easy to spot up front first against them. Why? Let's stick to the game. The QB system is the first one based on true balance - and you can usually get 2:1 to 2.5:1 advantages in material and numbers as the Russians. If the US has similar numbers to you, or God forbid outnumbers you in say, a meeting engagement, then you need to re think how you select troops. The Russian C2 system is not as powerful as the US, and this is the reality of training differences. Its a disadv. offset by the fact that their battlefield observation is generally on par or greater than the US's - culminating in a drone that literally cannot be engaged by the US currently. More than a fair trade off. I play the Russians or Ukrainians almost exclusively and have never had a rough time of giving an equal opponent a good fight. There's so many people on these forums who will legitimately scratch their heads at some of the complaints. There's plenty of legitimate criticisms one can make atm, that have been proven by forum members. For example and off the top of my head: Antarres (sorry if I misspelled) has shown the side armor of Abrams being far too durable and has even deduced why that may be. People have shown consistently that Bradley ERA blocks tend to not explode, leading a Bradley to eat round after round - that's only a few pages back on the screenshot thread; I have no doubt the Devs took notice. Stagler, who I believe is still on a vacation for being a pecker-head, and others have shown that the 152mm precision round fails to penetrate or even significantly damage Abrams with good, clean hits - another thing that is now being considered for future updates. Sublime as well has been proving through two separate DARs that a well handled Russian force can easily pull-around an American heavy team and inflict mass losses; offensively or defensively.

Well I can just tell this thread is going to be lovely.

I've gotten 76 and 17pdr kills at 1100m on Panthers as well - this was very rough luck for Ithikial that the follow-on shots hit at odd angles. However, that's how battle sometimes goes! He's definitely very skilled, though - we're watching a very good match-up.

Awesome, the perfect distraction I needed from studying. Nice tit-for-tat, I'd take a StuG for a Firefly any day of the week.

Excellent, its on. I'm hoping I put up a bit of resistance while I get my ass kicked around the map. I'll have the thread up in short order hopefully.

Alright, I'll contact Shane and see if we can agree on who will be who.

Been breaking in a friend who recently purchased CMBN; allowing him to attack in small/medium scenarios while I took "Green" or "Conscript" troops - he's a remarkably quick learner however and said he wanted to 'defend against something big.' Well then, my pleasure: August; just another day in the "Road March" War, when a German rearguard decides to make an issue of some small, anonymous hamlet, in short order two US Recon Jeeps are burning, both teams are able to bail out and grab cover. Shermans of A/37th with some infantry from A/10 riding close behind attack the town from an unexpected direction, over a wheatfield, rushing to clear this roadblock as well as rescuing the pinned Reconnaissance elements. PaKs, being labored into position by hand, are rapidly dealt with by massed fire from the Sherman platoon, the infantry keeping the crews from the breech with MG fire: The Infantry begin attacking in bounds towards the small hamlet, consisting of a church, a gas station, and a handful of bungalows. Of note however, is a small 3 story building that also forms part of the small crossroads - a key place to take. Germans rush to forward positions to contest this, and a handful are hit as they dash to the edge of the hamlet.

Well, at least you have a fight on your hands. It would be a boring DAR if you just paraded over the guy, right? Did the first mortar shot land dead-on, or did it take some spotting? I'm wondering if he set his troops to above-average settings.

I may be interested. Is it H2H compatible, and is there a recommended skill imbalance between opponents, like your Muddy Waters scenario?

Glad you all enjoyed it. I'm hoping to do another DAR soon with someone I'm trading PMs with, I've yet to broach the subject however.

Some sort of German AFV audio contact in the woods - did I miss something, or is that new? Looks to me like you're caving in an outpost line, and he's going to notch up resistance a bit in the treeline just in front of the actual objective.

True @womble; I'm putting the cart before the horse. Given that it was an upper-hull hit as well, I doubt the cannon is inoperable. Fog works both ways though! Its hard to tell from the video, but is the 17lbr unbuttoned? The 75 just behind it undoubtedly is...I just can't imagine why the 17lbr would be buttoned-up at this stage if it is.

Textbook with that StuG. Good use of the only tree as well - good thing you didn't need it. Ithikial's 17pdr was in a pretty good position as well, to be frank, so I think that was a crucial knock out. Looking forward to more.